Members of the Islamic State staged a brutal attack on a military hospital on Tuesday, killing at least 25 people and injuring dozens more. Local witnesses said gunfire and explosions echoed throughout the city Tuesday afternoon as armed men besieged the medical facility.
ISIS members attacked the 400-bed Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan military hospital located in one of the city's more affluent neighborhoods. Armed men and at least one suicide bomber forcefully made their way into the hospital, where former Afghanistan government soldiers and Taliban fighters were being treated.
Taliban spokesperson, Zabihullah Mujahid, confirmed that the attack was carried out by ISIS members. A suicide bomber reportedly destroyed the gate to the hospital, allowing other members to enter. A car carrying explosives was reportedly then detonated near the facility, killing several Taliban fighters.
A doctor, who declined to be named, said armed men entered wards housing wounded Taliban fighters. The men then shot the Taliban fighters as they lay in their beds. Witnesses said the men fired indiscriminately at anyone they saw inside the hospital.
Taliban officials confirmed that one of those that were killed during the attack was their senior commander, Mawlawi Hamdullah Rahmani. He had led the group's Kabul Corps and was one of the men that entered the presidential palace after the U.S. withdrew from the country.
The Islamic State Khorasan or ISIS-K claimed responsibility for the deadly attack just hours later.
Two powerful #explosions and the sound of gunfire were heard close to the Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan military hospital in the #Afghan capital #Kabul on Tuesday. pic.twitter.com/Rt8A1JME5L — ANews (@anews) November 2, 2021
Following the fall of the Western-backed government in August and the Taliban's control of the nation, ISIS-K assaults have increased across Afghanistan. The terrorist group has capitalized on the Taliban's inability to secure metropolitan areas.
The attack on the Sardar Mohammad Daud Khan hospital is one of the first major attacks by the militant group. It is also likely the Taliban's first encounter with a large-scale attack involving a suicide bomber and armed men raiding a crowded facility. The Taliban, who have been renowned for carrying out these sorts of acts as rebels over the previous 20 years, have little experience or expertise dealing with such an attack on their own.
Over the last several weeks, Islamic State members have killed at least 90 people and injured hundreds more in Kabul, Kunduz, and Kandahar. At the gates of Kabul's international airport in August, an Islamic State suicide bomber killed at least 170 civilians and 13 US military members.
